Talk:Office Open XML

Maintence section

This article needs a substantial section about the maintenance phase of the specification. In particular, a description of the lack of maintenance being done on the standard, as per this and this. (The latter is a blog post by Alex Brown, who convened the OOXML approval committee, in which he says the standard is "heading towards failure") Raul654 (talk) 18:34, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I was going to mention that blog entry too (thanks to the slashdot discussion), but then it appears that the blog author is already fairly active in this page already so I figured he'd be in a better position to write something accurate :) Thrapper (talk) 23:23, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree, and more generally a section or two over the controversy around OOXML must be added! At the moment the article reads as very plain and whitewashed. Mathmo ^Talk 03:17, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about the need for an entire section dealing solely with the controversy. We already have this, for instance,

The ISO standardization of Office Open XML was controversial and embittered, with IBM threatening to leave standards bodies that it said allow dominant corporations like Microsoft to wield undue influence. Microsoft was accused of co-opting the standardization process by leaning on countries to ensure that it got enough votes at the ISO for Office Open XML to pass.

Which appears alongside a link to the Standardization of Office Open XML article, where the controversy is discussed in depth. --Xyiyizi 18:08, 19 April 2010 (UTC)

A section about controversy and criticism doesn't really come under the "Maintence (sic) section" but it is a valid suggestion. Controversy about the standardization process is indeed covered elsewhere, but I believe Mathmo was talking more generally about criticism about OOXML. There used to be a criticism section (see for example http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Office_Open_XML&oldid=314111559#Criticism_of_ECMA-376_1st_edition ) but any criticism of OOXML in this page has been persistently deleted by a number of dedicated individuals. Thrapper (talk) 12:29, 26 April 2010 (UTC)

Ah, right, criticism of the spec itself. Yes, I agree that should be in there somewhere. --Xyiyizi 11:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Microsoft Employees? Kidding :P But clearly it shouldn't be as whitewashed as is it is now, after all I do believe (IMHO) that the majority of the news coverage OOXML has got is because of troubles it has had.... to ignore this is mind boggling. If people do remove worthy inclusions in the article then it should be reverted and then discussed here on the talk page Mathmo ^Talk 13:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

If you have some time to kill, have a browse through the archives of this talk page (see the small yellow box at the top of this page). It makes for some entertaining reading. Thrapper (talk) 18:03, 27 April 2010 (UTC)

I've read through all of the archives too. The vast majority of the contention this article has had can be put down to one rather, err, cantankerous and persistent fellow, who is now banned. I suppose making the article more neutral and getting a consensus about it should be easier now, but we should be careful not to go too far the other way.--Xyiyizi 11:32, 28 April 2010 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not about going one way or the other (whether it is "too far" or not). Take note that a number of editors (myself included) worked hard several months back to remove the "criticism" section and disperese its relevant information more usefully throughout the article, in line with Wikipedia best practice. I strongly second the suggestion to study the talk archive as (in addition to the bun fights) a lot of thoughtful hard work has gone into make the OOXML articles as they are today. As well as having pro-format trolls there has been damage from anti-format trolls too! Alexbrn (talk) 17:27, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

IBM Resistance/Controversy

Hi All,

The article states, "The ISO standardization of Office Open XML was controversial and embittered, with IBM threatening to leave standards bodies that it said allow dominant corporations like Microsoft to wield undue influence. Microsoft was accused of co-opting the standardization process by leaning on countries to ensure that it got enough votes at the ISO for Office Open XML to pass.[14]"

This appears to be a nearly verbatin quote from [14]. Unfortunately, [14] does not cite a source for its sensational claim. Perhaps it would be a good idea to cite IBM? Or simply state that IBM opposed the specification (and cite [14]) until the claim can be substantiated? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Noloader (talk • contribs) 19:57, 12 June 2010 (UTC)

You are right I modified the section to reflect the fact that this is InfoWorld view only. Until someone finds such quotation from an IBM source. In addition, I do not trust InfoWorld. It employs weasel wording to accuse Microsoft. Fleet Command (talk) 17:03, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Are you challenging the statement that 'the ISO standardization of Office Open XML was controversial and embittered'? Do you think it actually went very smoothly and amicably, with just this one publication, InfoWorld, making such an unusual claim? Well. I have no objection to people finding additional references to cover specific details - have a look in Standardization of Office Open XML, you may find something there that'll help - but I think that the general statement will have to be restored, to avoid falsely giving an impression that of all involved, only InfoWorld noticed any discord. --Nigelj (talk) 17:52, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I am challenging the said statement due to the lack of evidence to believe otherwise. If it was indeed embittered, InfoWorld was a poor choice for representing a gist of Standardization of Office Open XML article. Apart from my lack of trust for tabloids, (especially in regard to their favorite sport which is Microsoft-bashing,) I do not trust a journal that employs weasel words.

I just finished reading Standardization of Office Open XML and it gave me no evidence as to the extreme situation that InfoWorld tries to make me believe. InfoWorld is obviously exaggerating the situation. It seems that the process was Controversial but nontheless devoid of any wrongdoing, as stated by two official bodies which further investigated the issue.

Fleet Command (talk) 18:10, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

It is sourced to a WP:RS. Present a source which contradicts it and add that they disagree. Or use google and find many which confirm it. Takes seconds. Verbal chat 19:46, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

FleetCommand: Are you claiming that OOXML was never controversial, or that the ISO process for OOXML was never controversial? Are you claiming that there wasn't a lot of discussion at the time? Just because it was investigated and shown to be devoid of wrongdoing doesn't mean that it wasn't controversial - why was it further investigated by two official bodies if it was never controversial? Also here's another link if infoworld doesn't satisfy your personal evidence criteria: http://www.zdnet.com.au/war-rages-on-over-microsoft-s-ooxml-plans-339284737.htm - as Verbal says any search engine will show you several such articles. Thrapper (talk) 22:40, 22 July 2010 (UTC)

Neutrality

Since this page does not even hint on how the standardization was done, and all the politics and corruption, it is preferable to put the neutrality tag. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 14.96.149.236 (talk) 08:36, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

Did you actually read the article? The "Standardization process" section clearly states that the process itself involved controversy, and even includes quotes and some details about the major players' feelings and concerns/reactions. However, the article here is about all aspects of OOXML (the format itself, the technical details, the support by various software, the approval process, etc.). You concern that there is more to say about the controversy is valid, but there is so much to say that it was all pushed into a separate article, with just a quick summary here. What's left here is a brief summary, as it should be (IMO) per WP:SUMMARY when there is a secondary detailed article about a specific aspect of a major-topic article. DMacks (talk) 08:49, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

I concur. The article itself is neutral. Fleet Command (talk) 08:53, 18 March 2011 (UTC)

The 'Adoption' section

I think this section should be moved out of this article, perhaps into a general article about open standards in government if such an article exists. The premise of its inclusion here is wrong: the introduction says that the following bodies are considering using open standard file formats in general, and then the references (though often not the text in this article) go on to reiterate this. In the references, OOXML is sometimes given as an example of such a standard, alongside ODF and PDF for example. Yet to the casual reader, we see the headings: Office Open XML -> Adoption, and then Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Germany etc. If you just scan the text and omit the references, you would think that you just read that all these governments have adopted OOXML over all other formats, which they have not. This is misleading, by intention or not, largely due to its placement here, and partly due to shoddy wording that does not thoroughly represent what the cited refs say.. --Nigelj (talk) 19:45, 22 March 2011 (UTC)